adminMehluli Sibanda
DESPITE Zimbabwe losing the recently ended One-Day International series against India 5-0, Zimbabwean bowlers have come under lots of praise from India skipper for the tour Virat Kohli. The top order batsman, who led India on their visit to Zimbabwe which concluded on Saturday with India winning the fifth ODI at Queens Sports Club by seven wickets to achieve a clean sweep, said the Zimbabwean bowlers put India under a lot of pressure throughout the series.
“I was impressed by the Zimbabwean bowlers, especially the fast bowlers, they put us under lots of pressure throughout this series, they were really impressive,’’ said Kohli while addressing journalists at Queens Sports Club on Saturday.
Commenting on how Zimbabwe could improve their game after their dismal show, Kohli said the solution for Zimbabwe was playing more games on the international scene.
Zimbabwe, once a competitive unit in the shorter version of the game, have become a laughing stock on the international scene with their weaknesses again exposed by an Indian team which was not even at full strength.
“Zimbabwe will certainly get better if they play more international cricket that will help build confidence. Their batting was their biggest letdown, they could have shown lots of temperament with their batting, that comes with playing more international cricket,’’ Kohli said.
While bowlers like Tendai Chatara and Kyle Jarvis bowled superbly, Zimbabwe were heavily let down by their batsmen as batters like skipper Brendan Taylor and Malcolm Waller had a nightmare at the crease.
Taylor made back to back ducks in Bulawayo with his woes being compounded by some poor fielding from the Zimbabwe skipper in the series ending encounter when he dropped a catch that would have dismissed Indian opener Shikhar Dhawan and also missed out on an opportunity to run out Ajinkya Rahane.
Left handed batsman Sean Williams, the highest run scorer for Zimbabwe in the last ODI with a score of 51 runs believes they learnt a lot playing against the best one day team in the world.
He blamed Zimbabwe’s dismal show to the fact that their mindset was probably not for playing against a team in the calibre of India.
Williams who was the fourth highest run scorer for Zimbabwe in the series with 116 runs was disappointed that on the occasions when he batted well in the series, he was not able to lead Zimbabwe to victory.
The former Under-19 captain acknowledged that they did not play their best cricket but with the experience against India, they can be a tough team to beat in future.
Zimbabwe coach Andrew Waller said they had taken lots of positives from the matches against India. Waller said India won because they played good simple cricket while the Zimbabwean players tried to improvise a lot and did not play according to the game plan.
With Indian completely dominating the five match series, it came as no surprise that Dhawan was the highest run scorer in the series with 209 runs, scored at an average of 52.25 with a high score of 116 runs despite being rested for the fourth match, Kohli was second best with 197 runs while former Zimbabwe captain Elton Chigumbura showed his all round worth and finished third with 159 runs.
In the bowling department, Indian leg spinner Amit Mishra took 18 wickets having played in all the five matches with figures of six wickets for 48 runs in the last ODI being his best ever bowling analysis, the first time ever that he had picked up a five wicket haul.
The highest number of wickets by a Zimbabwean bowler was four from Jarvis who took two wickets for 18 runs in the last match after being left out of the fourth ODI.
The national players will not get much rest as Pakistan would be in the country in a few weeks time for a tour believed to be made up of all the three formats of the game, two Tests, three ODIs as well as two Twenty20 Internationals.
Online Reporter